Eleanor Henderson

The Ghost of Saint Nick

Sung to a mournful tune

Jolly Old Saint Nicholas, bend your ear this way.
Don’t you tell a single soul what I’m gonna say.
I lost my job, I lost my home, and now I’ve lost my way.

Christmas Eve is always coming, so now you dear old man,
Scare up some bread, scare up some cheese, and apples if you can;
A blanket for to wrap me in and shoes for my broken feet,
And cover against a hard cold rain that’s fallin’ in the street.

Some things I need quite badly, and I need them really soon –
Though you mostly work in December, and I know it’s only June.
I need to use a bathroom for just about an hour.
I need to shave, though I have no razor, and I badly need a shower.

The subway is the spring of a river of humans that fill the street.
They urgently need to be somewhere else – blind eyes and busy feet.
Sometimes I see people that knew me. Some turn and walk away.
Others will give me what they have. I say thanks, and wish ’em good day.

Jolly Old Saint Nicholas, you retired when I was seven.
Yet still your ghost appeared each year and left a candied heaven.
I miss who I was. I miss what I had. Now I’m mostly grievin’.
Saint Nick, come back to work again. I need something to believe in.